Yes, 3 more days cruising the Pacific Ocean. And there will be 3 more before we set foot on land, in Japan. Or maybe 4 – the International Date Line comes first and that confuses the heck out of everyone.

Day 4 was a no good, very bad, terrible day. Sunday and we went to brunch. But seas were running 8 to 10 feet and the ships was rocking badly, which is not good for a guy like me who is susceptible to seasickness. Couple that with the development of a full-blown head cold and I did not feel like eating much. I had orange juice and a croissant and went back to bed. And stayed in bed until dinnertime. Didn’t eat much then, either. But Marlene was her usual gregarious self and made friends with one of the entertainers on board, Richard Steele. I did rally enough to attend the comedy show that night. Two comedians who were reportedly quite good. But I slept through much of it.

By Day 5 (Monday) I had recovered a bit. And so had the ocean – waves were down to 2 to 4 feet. Marlene and I spend some time at the casino. I won $60 in the morning and lost $60 after noon, so I am still down $40. We did meet a really interesting fellow in the casino – JR. He is a retired butler who served 5 presidents in the White House. He had some really interesting stories. We also spent some time in the hot tub and met two women – one from Canada and one from Florida – and had dinner with them. We made plans to jointly rent a taxi in Tokyo to get a private tour.

We participated (though we arrived late) in a “guess the song and artist” country music trivia contest. It was entertaining because the emcee got the audience involved in the answers, including getting two men up to pantomime “The Devel Went Down to Geogia” song. Pretty funny.

I took a few photos of the atrium (I realized that I haven’t taken many photos of the ship yet) and our balcony. We went to the Richard Steele show at night. Very entertaining. A combination of magic and comedy.

On Day 6 I was nearly fully recovered but we did very little other than play cards. We got our caricature drawn in the morning, then spent some time in the casino. I won $65 but gave that all back – and more in the afternoon. Down $80. The seas were running 4 to 8 feet and it was quite chilly – in the high 50s – so we played cards with our jackets on. The card game is “Oh Shit” which is a rummy game with progressive wilds – 3s are wild when playing with hands of 3 cards, 4s when using 4 cards and so on. I lost every game.

We apparently crossed the International Date Line the evening of Day 6. One of our fellow passengers invited us up to the top deck so we could watch the line in the ocean as we crossed it. Yeah. We didn’t bite.

We have been pushing the clock back one hour every day. We are now 9 hours earlier than Fort Myers. Or 15 hours later after losing a full day. Very confusing. But we will get the day back when we return to the US.

There will be a lot of these “at sea” days to start the TP1, thanks to the storm in the Gulf of Alaska that prompted Carnival to cancel our Alaska ports.. As Alaska is the only state that I have never set foot in, the loss of those ports was deeply disappointing. But I am less distressed than the woman that I overheard during check-in who had sent items to Ketchikan to be taken with her on the cruise. I hope it wasn’t anything vital, like medicine.

Almost immediately after boarding I started to develop a scratchy throat. I didn’t sleep well that first night so after breakfast I fell sound asleep, waking around 1pm, totally disoriented. I thought it was morning and couldn’t understand why I had slept fully clothed on top of the bedspread. I figured it out, then went to lunch. I spent the afternoon reading and listening to music at the pool (but not IN the pool). Marlene and I spent a little time in the casino (down $40), had dinner (formal attire), danced a bit (the ship’s band is quite good) then watched the production of Flick in the theater. This was a revue of movie tunes, with some first-rate singing and dancing. I went straight to bed after the show.

There was a medical emergency the morning of Day 2 which resulted in a rescue via Coast Guard helicopter. It was amazing to watch this real-life drama play out. It is sad that someone’s 30-day cruise ended on Day 2, but it was probably a good thing as we were still close enough to shore to permit a helicopter evacuation.

On Day 3 my scratchy throat turned into sniffles and I wore my hoodie all day, to stay warm (it was a cloudy, cool day). The wind had whipped up some 5-to-7 foot swells and the ship got rocking pretty good. We had breakfast and lunch, of course, and I attended a military appreciation event by accident (I was trying to get to a sports trivia event but was off by an hour due to us setting to clocks back). I did ok, not great, on the sports trivia. I spent a few minutes in the casino in the afternoon (broke even so still down $40), Marlene and I took some ballroom dance lessons and we played some cards with Dottie and Maureen. Dinner was casual and I went straight to the room after dinner while Marlene listened to music with Dottie and Maureen. I bought 24 hours of internet and started working on this post.